Artistic Director

As conductor, choreographer, adjudicator, and educator, Markus Howard has worked extensively throughout the world in musical genres such as opera, musical theatre, pop, and jazz voice. His students have included members of Broadway and National Touring companies, the Stratford and Shaw Festivals, and Toronto’s Lion King, Mamma Mia, Billy Elliott, The Producers, and Jersey Boys. His talents have been recognized by Yamaha Music Canada, the Swedish Ministry of Culture, and the International Association of Jazz Educators. He was recently nominated, for the second time, by the Ontario Arts Council as a finalist for the prestigious Leslie Bell Prize for Excellence in Conducting.

Markus is Artistic Director for two of Ontario’s outstanding youth organizations: the Guelph Youth Singers and La Jeunesse Choirs of Northumberland County. He conducts the Oriana Singers of Northumberland and serves as guest conductor for professional ensembles, including Toronto’s St. James Cathedral Choir and the Larkin Singers. Markus is recognized for his skill in writing original librettos, and in composing and arranging choral music, and youth musicals and operas. As the Canadian Opera Company’s Lead Artist Educator, he will present three youth operas celebrating the 2015 Toronto Pan American Games.

Teaching in both the music and dance divisions, Markus served with the Royal Conservatory of Music Glenn Gould School and Young Artist Performance Academy, and the Randolph Academy for the Performing Arts. He represented UNESCO as an ambassador of Arts and Goodwill and he has appeared as a chorister with several European choirs and with numerous Canadian professional choirs. He directed the University of Toronto Hart House Jazz Choir and Massey College Choirs and is a much sought-after Canadian festival adjudicator in the choral, musical theatre, instrumental, dance, and acting categories. Markus is the founding conductor of the professional chamber choir La Movida, one of his proudest accomplishments, and he continues to share his skills with artists at home and abroad.